The exhibits have a singular theme: that each piece of work has a personal meaning to the artist who created it.

Art education senior Grecia Villa, one of the artists, said the diversity of the artists and their work contributes to the gallery's theme.

“Everyone has their own narrative," she said. "And we are all so different."

The gallery is full of different art styles to match the personality of the artists. There are detailed and life-like portraits of people mixed with abstract thoughts pulled deep from the mind of the individual who made it.

Villa said her method is taking old photos from her childhood and using a stencil to turn them into paintings. The use of her family as subject matter is what makes it personal to her.

Villa said she enjoyed having her work on display and sharing it with friends and family.

“It’s nice to have my peers come and see what I’ve been doing for my homework,” she said.

Painting senior Antonieta Carpenter-Cosand also used photos of her family as subject matter. Carpenter-Cosand said she used photos from when her grandparents, aunts and uncles were children, and turns those into paintings.

“(My paintings) are complex in the sense that I am using my past to connect to my present,” Carpenter-Cosand said.

Carpenter-Cosand said she had never met one side of her family until she was went to college. By using the old photographs, she said, she is able to connect to a missing part of her family and her past.

“Painting is a way to heal,” she said. “There is this gap in my life from where I never met my father, but now I’ll always have this information from my paintings.”

Nancy Salas, a painting senior, doesn’t use pictures for her paintings. Instead, she paints portraits of the people around her. Salas said she spent up to six months working on her pieces for the gallery to ensure they properly reflected the subject.